Most small business owners wish there were more hours in the day, so they could get more done (so they can generate the revenue they’re aiming for)
Turns out, the ‘not getting enough stuff done’ is NOT the real reason why so many businesses struggle (whereas, at least initially, the ‘not enough revenue’ is often real;-)
So, if I could travel back in time (say the 10 years since leaving the corporate world;-), I’d tell myself to do a few things VERY differently!
Specifically, I’d have a list with precisely 4 things to do every day, and then spend my day on exactly those 4 things (using one very specific way of doing them)
Probably no more than 45mins on each one, but that time 100% fully focused.
Add a couple of breaks in between, and you’re looking at a 3h45min workday … and I can guarantee you’d get more stuff done in those few short hours than most people in a week.
(and even if you halve this, and only do a little under 2h/day – you’ll still beat 99% of the rest of the population when it comes to ‘being productive’:
So, today, business-hyper-growth activity #1:
Focus on actually generating leads.
Before you throw up your hands in the air and exclaim: “but I don’t like talking to people and being all salesy…“
… STOP:
what I mean by ‘generating leads’ is:
finding places where your ideal clients hang out, and then make it known to those ideal clients that you have something that might be of interest to them.
This could any one of FB ads, ‘doing’ social media, networking, newspaper ads, phoning up people, asking for referrals, doing Adwords, JVs, solo-ads … whatever.
But, don’t do what this guy did:
a few years ago I gave a sales-seminar in a city called Monchengladbach in Germany.
In the evenings, I went to check out the various restaurants in town.
So, one day I just wandered into one I hadn’t been to (it’s the place marked with red arrows in the image above;-), and, as usual, started talking to the manager (in this case also owner) about their marketing.
Turns out, they’re doing ‘flyers’ – beautifully designed, very enticing, even with a coupon for first-time visitors.
Clearly they know what they’re doing.
Or so I thought!
So, I ask him:
“where do people find these beautiful flyers?“
His response:
“right here, on the counter at the bar“.
I still think I would’ve done him a service by slapping him:
“FFS, if people don’t know about your restaurant, how the beep are they going to come here and find your beautiful flyers on the bar?“
Your job is to give your prospects an opportunity to learn about whatever wonderful thing you have.
Especially in today’s “short-attention-span” world, people just aren’t to go out of their way to search for you … either they can easily find you, or they’ll go with whomever is willing to show them that they have got what they WANT.
Now, when you starting looking at this ‘generating leads’ business, one key distinction to keep in mind:
If you’re into ‘mass-marketing’ …
focus on testing lots of different angles.
You big opportunity and leverage-point here is the fact that you tend to have lots of traffic.
And that means lots of split-testing opportunities.
In other words: let the market tell you what they WANT (instead of you guessing)
If you’re into ‘high-end’ marketing focused on a smaller target audience …
focus more on inbound marketing based on personal outreach.
The reason is that you have less opportunity for split-testing lots of angles (because the traffic is limited).
The knowledge.ly team e.g. have built all their businesses based on ‘cold emails’ to the right recipients.
(hypercharge that by combining it with the principles of Chet Holmes’ “Dream 100”-approach)
And once you’ve got just a handful ‘in your world’ … then engage them in a meaningful dialogue to figure out what they really WANT.
The key here is that you’re actively going out (I call it “respectfully interrupting” your prospective clients, and then pulling in the ones that are a great fit), instead of hoping that they’ll somehow, magically stumble upon your site and instantly recognize how great your offer is.
So, Lesson #1: Please, (PLEASE) don’t be that owner-manager who does all kinds of beautiful marketing … but never actually shows it to potential clients.
Instead: Invest just 45mins of your time daily on this one activity, and do it consistently, and you’ll get massive results faster than a typical Monchengladbach restaurant goes out of business (which sadly is so quick that every time we ran workshops up there, there’d be new restaurants on that square)
comments, questions, concerns?
let me know below
Veit